photography group

hey so as most of you know i've coordinated a little photography group within the ward (although i am open to anyone joining) and we had our first little outing on tuesday. here are some of my favorite shots of the day. we had a good time for sure. linda blazed a trail straight through some very tall grass despite the signs warning us of rattlesnakes. man i was super paranoid but she seemed fine about the whole thing.....crazy! not sure yet where we are going next week but i am sure it will be just as great. anyhow well enjoy the shots...

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swimming...

here's a few pics of the kids swimming.....couldn't get a picture of any of the bigger kids swimming - they don't seem to be still for more than a second...and i don't take the camera up to the pool much...i did get one of them out of the pool while we were getting ready to go though....



































































and sorry, yes, i was messing around with a blur tool tonight trying to master something new....finally i was able to do it all without having to redo it twelve times. i don't know why this one was so hard for me to get - oh well! sorry for the over-blurring!

special places..

so i had this awesome idea to drive around one day and take some way cool pictures of places that are very special to nate & i. this is the final 8 pictures that i chose. i had them printed and we put them up in our room as a mural -

i thought it was a pretty cool project....and i think it turned out pretty swell. what do you think..?

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some people say....

..we look alike.....ya think...? even avery couldn't tell herself apart from larkin in these pictures...















auntie lia do you have any pictures of larkin doing anything like this......?

...blah blah blah.....it's my birthday...blah blah....

so today i turn the big 31. ya ok so it's not a big number in terms of importance, but it's big in terms of numerical value. just yesterday one of my friends said, "31..? oh you're still a baby...." ok uhhh they aren't but 5 years older. but seems like a generation away in terms of music. ha ha. ok little dig there.

anyhow so yeah like i said blah blah blah it's my birthday. whoooopeee. i'm not sure it's going to be all that different than any other day in my life. my mother in law said to "pamper" myself today. and when i told nate that he said, "yeah you should".

funny. not sure why but i find that funny.

whatever. ok so happy birthday to me. avery keeps arguing with me that it's HER birthday. oh boy. she's in for a struggle since ethan's is in a few days and britton's is later this month. it's pretty cute though..

my favorite song.....

ha....i love this song!!! nate thinks i am a NERD for singing it around the house but i can't stop! i love this show!!!

pink pants.

ok so it's official. she's a PINK monster....

avery will only wear her PINK pants. i have to wash them every other day so she can wear them every other day. she gets in such a wad if you don't let her wear her PINK pants. she only has this one pair and they are too tight for her and they look silly with half of the things she wants to wear them with but ug. it's murder trying to get her into anything else once she has seen the PINK pants. sometimes she calls them GREEN pants but i know she means her PINK pants.



can you guess who she's related to...? someone else who would ONLY WEAR PINK FROM HEAD TO TOE WHEN SHE WAS YOUNGER.....who still loves PINK pants i am sure...i could try to dig out a pic of her in nothing but pink but i am sure that there probably isn't one since i would do my very best to never dress her in PINK while at our house instead of just letting her be herself........oh the mistakes we make with our kids.....

most of you i am sure can guess who that is. anyhow here are a few snaps of avery in her favorite outfit. her PINK pants and her PINKIE PIE my little pony SPARKLY shirt.

thanks linds and ashlynn for the super SPARKLY pinky pie shirt....

ethan finn.....

this morning ethan came and got me out of bed because he said he wanted to "show me something outside". so i came down the stairs and followed him on the porch and he showed me the pile of nuts and hardware from his bike. he had taken off his own training wheels. he even knew to use the wrench. smart kid. anyhow i saw the rubber mallet next to the wrench as well and i must've made a weird face at it because ethan then told me, "ok well the hammer is out because i was just going to destroy the bike but then i thought i would just take my training wheels off instead....i just felt like i was ready."

hysterical.

anyhow here is a little video of him riding. try not to notice that his shirt is filthy and he's in flip-flops and pajama pants. yeah you could say he dressed himself. but oh well....when the moment is there you can't stop to make sure everyone is clean and looking their best. you just have to capture it as it happens!

he really didn't need any help at all i just held on to the back of his seat for security to make him feel better for a minute and then he was just gone.....pretty amazing that he was able to just pick up and ride just like that....



ethan went on a little bike ride with nora. or as avery calls her "my nora".

so sorry...

ok so now i am starting to feel the sting of deleting my old blog.....man i wish i hadn't done that! so this one is so new that i'm not really feeling it. maybe at some point i will like this one but i miss my other one.

poop!!!!